1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an idling control apparatus for a vehicle that has an idling reduction function for stopping an idling operation of an engine to automatically stop the engine when a predetermined driving condition is satisfied.
2. Description of the Related Art
In order reduce fuel consumption and emissions, various idling reduction technologies for vehicles have been proposed and put into practical use. These idling reduction technologies automatically stop an engine when the engine is not required to be operated during waiting for a traffic light to change, for a train to pass, for a person to come, and restart the engine when the engine is required to be operated again. For example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication (JP-A) No. 2004-232538 disclosed a technology for a vehicle having an idling control function that automatically stops an engine based on the actuation of a brake pedal when the vehicle is stopped and restarts the engine based on the release of the brake pedal or the depression of an accelerator pedal. According to this technology, an obstacle detection sensor is provided for detecting an obstacle ahead of the vehicle. When the sensor detects that an obstacle is approaching ahead of the vehicle before the engine is automatically stopped, the automatic engine stop based on the actuation of the brake pedal is prohibited.
The aforementioned idling reduction function is not very effective in reducing fuel consumption or rather increases it when a vehicle is stopped for only a short time. The technology for an idling control apparatus disclosed in JP-A No. 2004-232538 may be effective against this problem. However, this technology prohibits idling reduction whenever an obstacle is approaching ahead of the vehicle. Accordingly, when the vehicle stops due to traffic congestion for example, idling reduction is not performed. As a result, the number of executions of idling reduction substantially decreases, which prevents advantages of idling reduction to be fully achieved.